Thursday, August 16, 2012

McElroy List: Names Left Off & Motive

Jack McElroy said on his blog that he got Lee Tramel's personal contact list through a routine Open Records Request and that Tramel had sent a mass email "of a political nature".

As a name on the mass email, I went back and found it. It was a mass email sent on September 14, 2011. The political nature of the mass email was a tv news story about Obama's Aunt.

Interesting that the only government address on the mass email was the city of knoxville email address of former Knoxville Mayor Candidate Ivan Harmon.

Let's travel back to September 2011. On September 27, 2011 the City of Knoxville Primary Election was held. Eventual Knoxville Mayor Madeline Rogero missed winning the election out right in the September 27 primary, short a few votes or hundred.

It appears that 13 days before the primary election, Jack McElroy was doing some fishing in an effort to catch Ivan Harmon doing something wrong politically in his campaign for Mayor.

Of that mass email distribution list 15 names were dropped off the Jack McElroy "McElroy List".

The question is since the only government address on the mass email address was a City of Knoxville email address, what right does Jack have to open record request of the county regarding personal email addresses.

McElroy will likely rely on the opinion of Frank Gibson. Last time I checked Gibson's opinion carries no case law. His opinion is no better than the opinion of anyone else.

In addition, the private citizens have fourth amendment right protection.

Because the KNS violated that law when their employees Ansley Haman and Michael Patrick took a private email addressed to them and gave it to their boss Jack McElroy. This is illegal data-mining and the KNS can be sued.